CRISIS IN SCRIPTURE STUDIES
To be exact, we should speak of one crisis following on the heels of
another. And even though we intend to focus primarily on events since
Vatican II, yet the roots for these things go back farther, and cannot be
ignored.
We go back briefly to the sixth century B. C. "Xenophanes of Colophon" was
worried about the immoral effects of the myths about Zeus -- reasonably
so, for those who believed in Zeus. A teenager debating with himself about
having sex could turn to the example of Zeus, and decide to imitate the
greatest and best of the gods! So, he proposed to reinterpret the stories
allegorically. Others too, such as Plato, feared the same thing. So there
was a tendency to allegorical interpretation of texts.
In passing we might note that just as the more intellectual Greeks around
400, began to disbelieve the myths about the gods, so also did the Romans,
though later, around 100 B. C. Then arose Marcus Terentius Varro, who led
what we might call the great renewal of pagan theology - change the
content, keep the outward form. St. Augustine scathingly attacked him in
books 6 & 7 of "City of God."
Jewish writers took up the same allegory even before Christ, to make
Jewish dietary laws seem reasonable to gentiles. A shining example is
Philo.
It was into such a world that the first Christian writers, even St. Paul,
moved. The sort of schools to which St. Paul went often would take a text
whose words could carry the desired meaning, and cite them as proof texts.
When St. Paul does this, the meaning he gives the words is always
something correct in itself, even if not the original sense, e.g., a
major text of Habakkuk 2: 4: "The just man will live by faith."
The Alexandrian school, where these tendencies to allegorizing were strong
even in pagan literature, was the center for early Christian
interpretation of Scripture. Origen is of course a great example, who went
so far as to say that everything has a spiritual sense, but not everything
has a literal sense ("De principiis." 4. 3. 5).
St. Augustine, worried by the Manichean attacks on the great men of the
Old Testament, was ripe for allegory, which he found fully in the sermons
of St. Ambrose, who as Augustine tells us, cited 2 Cor 3:6: "The letter
kills, but the spirit gives life," totally without regard to original
context, and made it mean that a literal reading of some things in
Scripture can be deadly, e. g. , the story of the deception practiced by
Jacob to get his Father's blessing. But, said Ambrose, the spiritual
interpretation is life-giving.
This bore bitter fruit when Augustine turned to the imagery of the potter
and his clay in Romans 9. He thought the gob of clay on the table was the
whole human race, made into a "massa damnata et damnabilis" by original
sin. God could throw the whole damned gob into hell without waiting for
any individual sins. But He wanted to display mercy and justice, Augustine
thought. To display mercy, He would rescue a small percent from the
"massa." The rest He would desert, to their eternal ruin. Only a small
percent were to be picked for salvation, and blindly, without looking at
their lives, to show everyone should have gone to hell. In such a system
God would not love anyone at all, not even those whom He would rescue, for
to love is to will good to another for the other's sake. God would will
good to some, but not for their sake - He would pick them blindly, would
not really care about anyone.
The school of Antioch tried to go back to what the author really meant to
say, but did not have nearly so many adherents, especially after The
Second Council of Constantinople in 533 condemned a great exponent of that
school, Theodore of Mopsuestia. The Council called him "wicked". He had
anticipated the "Last Temptation", saying Christ had disorderly emotions.
His school wanted to make Jesus very human.
Even where a scholar tried to find what the inspired author really meant
to say, there was commonly a neglect of the context. This helped drag out
the debates "De auxiliis" from 1597 to 1607 -- both sides were misusing
Scripture at practically every turn. This neglect of context was not to be
avoided by many Catholic scholars until our own times. And even now it is
not entirely dead. In 1980 at a CBA convention in Duluth, after discussing
various things in Scripture with another exegete present, I brought up the
case of Gal 3:28: "In Christ there is neither male nor female." It was
and is being used to support women's ordination. I pointed out the context
of Galatians was justification by faith. In seeking it, it makes no
difference if one is male or female. We may not extrapolate the non-
difference to everything else. My companion was so angered at my saying
that that he walked away, would not any longer speak to me. It so happened
that CBQ not long before had published a report of a sort of task force on
women's ordination, which made that same unfortunate appeal to Gal 3:28.
The real beginning of the modern historical critical method appeared with
a Catholic priest, Richard Simon (1638 - 1712). His proposals suggested
the direction of supposing the Pentateuch was made up of four documents.
The worst extreme here was that of Julius Wellhausen (1844- 1918). This
tendency is by no means dead today. No less than John Paul II in his
series of audiences on Genesis spoke of the JEPD theory with obvious
favor, without however, meaning to impose it on the Church. (Cf. John
Paul II, "Original Unity of Man and Woman, Catechesis on the Book of
Genesis," Boston, St. Paul Editions, 1981. It contains audiences from Sept
12, 1979 to Jan. 2, 1980).
Interestingly, many who are hardly conservative are now strongly rejecting
the JEPD theory. Thus Joseph Blenkinsopp in his review of R. N. Whybray,
"The Making of the Pentateuch" (JSOT Suppl. 5, Sheffield, 1987) wrote
(CBQ, 1989, pp. 138-39) that the documentary hypothesis, "is in serious
trouble, with no viable alternative yet in sight." Whybray has no
difficulty in showing the fragility of many arguments used to support it
the old theory. The criterion for telling one source from another "called
for an unreasonable level of consistency within the sources. . . . the
same consistency was not required of the redactors." A computer study done
at the Technion Institute in Israel (Y. T. Radday and H. Shore, "Genesis:
An authorship Study in Computer-assisted Statistical Linguistics" in
"Analecta Biblica" 103, 1985) concluded there was only one author for all
of Genesis.
Two currents that started early, and are still running are these: tendency
to deny the supernatural, the tendency to fit everything into a mold
suggested by Hegel.
A major influence in our time is still R. Bultmann - even though some
scholars refuse to admit that influence. But J. Fitzmyer in his recent
(1987) little book, "Paul and His Theology," cites Bultmann about 15 times
- not using the latter's errors, but still showing much respect to the
king of "eisegesis." Eisegesis is the opposite of exegesis. The latter
tries to bring out what is really in the text - eisegesis reads things
into the text. Bultmann, despairing of being able to know much for certain
about Christ, said we had better make the Gospels mean the same as the
foolish existentialism of M. Heidegger.
Strange to say, Bultmann had a pastoral purpose, and thought he was
working against the wild excesses of Liberal exegesis. He proposed, inter
alia, finding scientific criteria for discerning what was and was not
genuine in the accounts about Jesus. So he proposed four criteria.
Cardinal Ratzinger, in his 1988 lecture, "Biblical Interpretation in
Crisis" (p. 8) said that while the form-critical work of Dibelius and
Bultmann has been surpassed and even corrected, his "basic methodological
approaches continue even today to determine the methods and procedures of
modern exegesis."
An example of this sort of thing is found in a most influential work by
John P. Meier, Professor of Scripture at C. U. A. The book is called "A
Marginal Jew" - not much of a compliment for the Son of God! But the book
has received most lavish interfaith praise, from Rabbis, Protestants, and
Catholics. Joseph A. Fitzmyer, recently retired from CUA said that, "Meier
asks all the right questions. . . and invariably comes out with the right
answers." Rabbi Burton Visotzky said: "Careful, cautious and prudent, John
Meier's work will for generations serve as the guide on the quest for the
historical Jesus." Paul Achtemeier of Union Theological Seminary in
Virginia said, "Meier has set a new standard against which all future
studies of this kind will have to be measured."
Meier proposes first (p. 168) the, "criterion of embarrassment." It means
that the Church would hardly have made up things that weakened its
position. A "prime example is the baptism of the supposedly superior and
sinless Jesus by his supposed inferior John the Baptist. . . ." Meier adds
that the "radical" Fourth Evangelist. . . locked as he is in a struggle
with latter-day disciples of the Baptist. . . takes the radical expedient
of suppressing the baptism of Jesus. .
. altogether."
We comment that John did not really "suppress" a loaded word - the baptism
- he merely did not have occasion to use it.
Another example given by Meier (p. 170) is "the unedifying groan" of Jesus
in saying, "My God, why have you forsaken me?" Which John replaces by a
cry of triumph: "It is accomplished." To be fair, we add that in the next
paragraph Meier says that form-critical studies of the Passion narratives
show that the early form of these used OT Psalms.
Another criterion is that of discontinuity (p. 171) inherited directly
from Bultmann. A thing may be true if it "cannot be derived either from
Judaism at the time of Jesus or from the early Church after him." What a
reduction! Jesus was a Jew, came fulfilling the OT prophecies, yet
anything that is Jewish is open to suspicion! And again, if we believe He
founded a Church, we must drop all that the early Church repeats.
Again, we give Meier credit for pointing out that if we used the same sort
of criterion on Luther, little representative would be left.
Since we have scant data outside the Gospels, and since they are,
"suffused with the Easter faith. . . and were written from forty to
seventy years after the events
Actually, sources were abundant. We will outline them later.
But Meier continued: ". . . how can we tell what comes from Jesus or what
was "created by the oral tradition of the early church." In at least 16
places Meier speaks of the "creativity" of the early community - no
control by Apostles of course. And although Meier is so very demanding of
proof for things in general, when he makes such repeated assertions of
creativity, not once does he offer a shred of evidence for such
creativity. We wonder: How creative would he think St. Ignatius of Antioch
would be, who was eaten alive by the wild beasts in the arena about 107 A.
D. , after urging the Christians in Rome that in case they had influence,
they should not get him off: he wanted to die for Christ. It would be good
to take a copy of his letter to Rome to the zoo, and read it by the lions'
den, and ask how creative a man can be in such a situation? This belief in
creativity is inherited from the Form and Redaction critical work of
Bultmann. Thus Bultmann had said that the "controversy dialogues" are,
"creations of the Church" (History of the Synoptic Tradition 40, n. 2). So
again we need the criteria!
Did Jesus work miracles? Bultmann had said that one who has seen the
electric light and the "wireless" can no longer believe in miracles (in
"Kerygma & Myth" I. 5). In fact, he said, if science cannot explain a
cure, to consider it miraculous would be superstition - while if science
can explain it, it would be all right to call it a miracle (in "Kerygma &
Myth" I, 197,. 199)! Meier is not outdone. He admits that the
contemporaries of Jesus thought he worked miracles, but, "Whether what
people thought happened actually did happen is obviously another
question."
So, with scant sources, mostly late, and with a creative community, can we
really know much about Jesus? Bultmann thought all we can be sure of it
the "dass." Meier is not far behind. We need to add that even though he
does not go so far, yet Cardinal Ratzinger insists that it is impossible
to escape subjectivity (p. 7): "Pure objectivity is an absurd abstraction.
. . interest itself is a requirement for the possibility of coming to
know."- We notice the ambiguity of the word : "interest". For example, I
have much interest in natural science, have had it for years, I read
Science News weekly. But that interest does not make me biased about
natural science.
All the reviewers that I have seen have said that Meier forgets we need
faith. But to say that is to fall into the trap of fideism. Bultmann would
be pleased. He wrote (KM 211)."The man who wishes to believe. . . must
realize that he has nothing in his hand on which to base his faith." He
boasts that Luther had removed all security in the moral sphere, with his
teaching on justification by faith - he, Bultmann, added that there is no
basis for belief.
Not only Meier seems to favor such fideism. Thomas Hoffman, of Creighton
University (in CBQ of July 1982, pp. 447-69) wrote that Scripture is so
full of errors that to try to answer the charges is, "basically patching
holes on a sinking ship." But on p. 467 Hoffman said if one has real faith
he will not want such answers. That would be a search for security, "that
is not only nonexistent but incompatible with total dependence upon the
faith-covenant". For, he said, an inspired work is simply, "a writing in
which they experience the power, truth, etc. of the spirit of Christ. . .
."
A major Protestant problem, which is genuine according to Meier's
criterion of embarrassment, is the question of how to know which books
really are inspired. In 1910 a Baptist professor, Gerald Birney Smith,
gave a paper at the national Baptist convention, in which he reviewed all
possible ways of determining which works are inspired. He rejected all of
them, saying it could be done only if there were a providentially
protected teaching body . Of course he denied that there is such a body.
So poor Smith admitted, "Nothing is more noticeable than the gradual
disappearance of that word 'infallible' from present-day theologies."
Incidentally, Smith reviewed and rejected the proposal of Calvin
(Institutes 1. vii): "The word will never gain credit in the hearts of men
till it be confirmed by the internal testimony of the Spirit." The
resemblance to Hoffman's proposal is obvious.
Smith's article appeared in "The Biblical World" 37, 1911, pp. 19-29.
More recently, in 1937, the Lutheran Concordia publishing house presented
Gerhard Maier, "The End of the Historical Critical Method". in which we
find (on pp. 61 and 63) "Only scripture itself can say in a binding way
what authority it claims and has." So inspired Scripture is inspired
because inspired Scripture says inspired Scripture is inspired!
Raymond E. Brown in many places, such as NJBC (p. 1169), insists that
Vatican II allows us to say that there are all kinds of errors in
Scripture, in science, history and even in religion - only things needed
for salvation are protected by inspiration. Hence he insists that Job 14.
13 ff raises the possibility of an after life, and then denies it. Brown
said that if anyone tries to differ from this position of his, it is an
"unmitigated disaster". He claims to found his view on a line in Vatican
II, DV paragraph 11: "since all that the inspired authors or sacred
writers assert should be regarded as asserted by the Holy Spirit, we must
acknowledge that the books of Scripture firmly, faithfully and without
error teach the truth which God, for the sake of our salvation, wished to
be confided to Sacred Scripture." Brown insists the underlined passage is
restrictive, not descriptive, i.e., that it means to say only such
things are inerrant. Brown points to the "prevoting debates", i. e. , the
day when Cardinal Koenig arose and gave a list of errors in Scripture.
Sadly, a large number of bishops chimed in with him. Yet the Holy Spirit
was at hand, and no trace of this idea is found in the final text of
Vatican II. Most importantly, Brown ignores the fact that the Council
itself gave several notes on the very passage, sending us to earlier
pronouncements of the Church, including the statement of Vatican I that
God Himself is the chief author of Scripture. Of course, Brown thinks he
can get around it. He says there are two ways to look at Scripture. One is
"a priori," in which we say God is the author, and so error is possible.
But there is also, he asserts, the "a posteriori" way: look at the text,
see all the errors, decide there are errors.
The incredible thing is that today, now that we have new techniques for
studying Scripture, not possessed by earlier scholars, even at the
beginning of the 20th century, we have the means of answering countless
claims of error, which earlier exegetes could not answer. Yet at this very
point, those, like Brown, who are supposed to know these techniques,
insist on saying the problems cannot be solved, that to try, e.g., to
solve the problem of Job 14:23 - which is really easy -- is an
"unmitigated disaster"!
As if for our consolation, if we do not know much, neither did Jesus,
really a "marginal Jew". Brown ("Jesus God and Man") accumulates NT text
after text to show ignorance in Jesus. Yet, twice, on pp. 42 and 68) Brown
admits that all his evidence is inconclusive. Why then not just believe
the Church? Brown is not even sure Jesus knew much about the afterlife (
p. 56): "We cannot assume that Jesus shared our own sophistication on some
of these questions. . . how can we be sure that he knew it [heaven] was
not above the clouds?" Jesus even had at least one superstition ("St.
Anthony's Messenger," May , 1971, pp. 47-48) in supposing demons inhabited
desert places, while Paul thought they lived in the upper air." Care for
the genre of the passages referred to ( Mt 12:43-45, where Jesus is
giving a sort of parable, and Eph 2:2 in which Paul is using the language
of his opponents to counter them) should show that there is no real
problem, or at least, a consideration of the context. Again, we note: How
odd that those who know so well the modern tools of research should leave
them unused at times! Really, the use of the approach via literary genres,
plus form and redaction criticism can solve a host of previously
unsolvable problems about freedom from error in Scripture.
For good measure, we add that Meier spends page after page trying to show
Jesus had four blood brothers, and at least 2 Sisters -- and yet asked an
outsider, John, to take care of His Mother. Also Meier tells us that
rabbinic tradition, starting with Philo, held that Moses after his first
encounter with God, no longer had sex with his wife. What about Our Lady
and Joseph! (Other arguments of Meier can be met as easily).
We have given a good sampling of some, not nearly all, of the worst
results of the historical-critical method. Now we had better add that many
Scripture scholars are abandoning that method for various other things.
Thus Reginald H. Fuller, one of the leading form critics, today has said
that the whole method is "bankrupt."
But enough of this chamber of horrors. Is there any way out? any
salvation? We are so bold as to say loudly: yes, there is.
First of all, Vatican II is not at all responsible for the chaos. Quote
the opposite. If its principles had been followed, these things would not
have happened. However, before we can cite Vatican II, we must, logically,
show that the Church does have a divine authority to teach. Sadly, the
reviewers I have seen of Meier's book have merely said that we need faith.
But that is like jumping up onto Cloud 9, with no basis for faith. Meier
had proposed this situation: Let us lock up in a good library a group of
Catholics, Protestants, and people of other denominations. They cannot get
out until they can agree on some things about Jesus. What he offers is
what he thinks they would come up with. They were not supposed to appeal
to faith at all. And so we cannot do that either until we have shown by
reason that faith is reasonable and even demanded.
Faith does have a place, but only after one has first, without the use of
faith, shown that the Church does have a teaching commission from Christ.
Can this be done? Emphatically yes, but we make so bold as to say that we
need a somewhat different method of apologetics to do it. We will sketch
it presently.
But first, we said there was one crisis on top of another. It is this: as
we said, many major scholars are now saying the whole historical-critical
method, which has reigned for two centuries, must be dropped. We mentioned
specially Reginald. H. Fuller, one of the most prominent form critics, who
says, as we reported, the method is "bankrupt" and should be supplemented
with feedback from the believing community. Not a few others have joined
him.
Really, the essential features of the historical critical method are not
wrong, if only excesses are avoided - we will take that up shortly. But
the practitioners were guilty of bad judgment long ago in not seeing the
limitations of the method. Instead they built one house of cards on top of
another, and in shocking cockiness called it "the assured results of
science." Now they see the flimsiness, and overreact.
Not all scholars are giving up. But many are, and many are doing it more
quietly. Some abandon historical-critical method by just shifting to other
methods. Hence we can speak of a crisis on top of a crisis.
For a time there was a flurry with "Semiotic studies" - with meager
results, sometimes skewed by a priori notions. Others are turning to
"psychological analysis or sociological analysis." These can be useful,
but only as supplements, not as the whole method. Some are using it for
the whole work now.
There is a considerable vogue now for "Narrative Criticism," which
involves much subjectivity. In this, one speaks not of the real author,
e.g., Luke, but of the "implied author," who is not a flesh and blood
person, but just a literary entity to be found in the text. For example,
if we read a sonnet of the real Shakespeare we do not understood the full
person, Shakespeare, but just the feelings, values, concerns etc. that are
expressed in the text. So one and the same real author might write a wide
variety of different works, each having its own different implied author.
Similarly we are not concerned with the actual readers of Luke but of the
"implied reader." Here is more subjectivity: the role of the implied
reader may vary from one actual reader to another, since the reader and
the text are indeterminate. Now when people become implied readers, to the
extent that they fulfill the role the text presupposes, to that extent the
actual reader makes a strong commitment to the act of reading and so comes
to know himself more deeply: the act of reading may transform one's life.
Reader-response critics say if one does not become as it were a slave of
the ideology involved in the text and share it, one simply cannot read it.
But only a believer can take the role of the implied reader of a given
biblical text.
But further, in a narrative, such as Luke's Gospel, there is a "narrator"
- who is the one who tells the story, which of course need not be Luke.
The person and activity of the narrator may be the key to understanding
the true nature and purpose of a particular implied text. There is "also
the narratee," the one to whom the narrator tells the story . Again, this
narratee is different from the real reader and even from the implied
reader.
Some narratees, in this view, are supposed to know nothing, to be almost
idiots.
And there is more, but let this suffice for an example of the sort of
thing that now develops if one has stopped trying to use the historical
critical method.
What can we do positively to prove that the Catholic church has teaching
authority from God?
There will be two phases to our work:
First phase:
We need a source for the truth about Jesus. What kind of a source? We
must take care to avoid a vicious circle -- that would come if we said:
Believe the Gospels because the Church says so; believe the Church because
the Gospels say so."
But it is easy to avoid that vicious circle. We will start with the
Gospels, but for some time we not look on them as inspired or sacred -
that needs to be proved later. We will look on them as simply ancient
documents.
What do we need then?
a) We need to see that the Gospels intend to give us the truth about
Jesus, not just some imaginations. This is obvious, for the first
Christians, as well as we, believe that their eternal fate depends on the
truth about Jesus.
But there is an objection. Norman Perrin, famous Professor at University
of Chicago, in "Rediscovering the Teaching of Jesus" (N. Y. 1967., p.
26) wrote: "No ancient texts reflect the attitudes characteristic of the
modern western world."- We wonder if Perrin ever actually read the ancient
texts. Herodotus, earliest Greek historian, said in 7. 152: ". . . my duty
is to report all that is said, but I am not obliged to believe it all
alike - a remark which may be understood to apply to my whole History." He
knew that the remote periods were very foggy, but did try with great care
to get the facts on things of his own time. Thucydides in 1. 22: "I have
not ventured to speak from any chance information. . . . I have described
nothing but what I either saw myself, or learned from others from whom I
made the most careful and specific inquiry." Polybius, another Greek
historian, in 3. 59 said the historian is obliged, "To give his own first
allegiance to the truth. . . and nothing but the truth." Livy, great Roman
historian, on the problem of how the Lacus Curtius got its name (7. 6. 6):
"I would make every effort to find out the truth if there were a path that
would lead me to it. . ." Modern historians say that the Roman Tacitus,
around 100 A. D. should get an A for facts - they think he may have been
hostile to some persons, e. g. , Tiberius, but we can tell who.
The Gospel writers write in this current, and have much more reason to get
at the truth. As we said, they knew their eternal fate depended on the
truth about Jesus.
b) Could the Gospel writers get at the truth? Yes, in spite of the sloppy
claims of Meier and others. Here are some of the sources for them: (1)
Clement I was elected in 88 or 92. In his letter to Corinth, c. 95, he
said that Peter and Paul were of his own generation. Peter and Paul died
around 66 or 67. So Clement must have heard them preach in Rome. (2) St.
Ignatius was Bishop of Antioch, where not long before Peter himself had
been the bishop. And Paul had made Antioch his base of operations. So the
facts would be well known there. Ignatius was eaten by animals in Rome c.
107. He wrote to the Roman Christians saying that if some had the
influence to get him off, they should not use it. He wanted to die for
Christ. Again, let those who charge creativity take his letter to the
lion's den in the zoo, and read it there, asking: Did this man just make
things up? (3) Quadratus, writing an apology c. 123, said in his day some
were still alive who had been cured by Christ or raised by Him. That would
easily cover 80-90, the period where the critics want to put Matthew and
Luke. (4) Imagine a teenager at the time of the death of Christ, c. 30.
Fifty years later he would be 65, and it would be 80 AD, when Mt. and Lk
should have written. Not so many lived to 65 then, but many did.
c) It is said, "There is no such a thing as an uninterpreted report." Even
Cardinal Ratzinger (p. 6), said: "Pure objectivity is an absurd
abstraction." We answered him above. Now we add: Yes, in so many things
reports are interpreted by subjectivity. But there are some things of such
simple structure that there is simply no room for subjective distortion,
e.g., when the leper stood before Jesus asking to be healed, and He
said: "I will it, be healed." Anyone present could report it, with no room
for subjectivity.
Second Phase: Six points: Here the sequence is of vital importance. Some
apologists try to prove the divinity of Christ before proving the
commission of the Church. The Arian experience shows how terribly
difficult it is to work from Scripture alone on this.
We should notice too as we go along that these six points are all of such
simple structure that they are not affected by the fear of subjectivity we
have just answered.
(1) There was a man named Jesus. This is evident all over the Gospels.
Besides, Tacitus, whom modern scholars consider highly accurate on facts
(cf. Sir Ronald Syme, "Tacitus," 2 vols. who has checked everything
possible in Tacitus) wrote in "Annals" 15: 44:
"The author of the name, Christ, was executed in the reign of Tiberius, by
the procurator Pontius Pilate."
(2) He claimed he was sent by God as a sort of messenger. This is obvious
all over the Gospels. He claimed authority over the sacred law (Mt
5:21-44), said He was greater than Jonah and Solomon (Mt 12:42-43),
claimed He could forgive sins (Mark 2:1-12 and parallels).
(3) He did enough to prove He was such, by means of miracles worked in
contexts where there was a tie between the miracle and the claim. For
example he cured the paralytic in Mk 2:1-12 to prove He had forgiven the
man's sins. He often made such a connection, e.g., Mk 5:21-43; Mt 8:5-13
and 9:27-29.
Foolishly, the "New Jerome Biblical Commentary" claims He never made such
a claim (p. 1371). It cites Mt 4:5-7 (refuses to work a miracle at
suggestion of devil); Luke 23:6-12 (refused a miracle to please
curiosity of Herod); Mk 8:11-13 (refuses the bad faith of Pharisees
asking a sign, when they had seen so many); Mk 15: 31-32 (enemies
challenge Him to come down off the cross). These claims are unworthy of
any scholar.
Equally foolish is the claim that many, such as Apollonius of Tyana, were
much the same. The slander comes from Hierocles governor of Bithynia in
307, who tried to make such a claim. But the differences are immense and
obvious. He had a discussion on the breeds and intelligence of elephants
(2: 11-16). In India he saw dragons about 60 feet long (3: 7), whose eyes
contained mystic gems, so large if hollowed out they would hold enough
drink for four men. He saw robot tripods that served meals (3: 27). He
found source of Nile, where demons gathered: he was afraid of them and of
the roar. Miracles were never done with a tie to the claim. In 6: 27 he
found a satyr annoying women, and quieted the satyr with wine. He met a
woman who had a possessed son - the demon was the ghost of man who fell in
battle. When his wife married in 3 days he was disgusted with women,
became homosexual (after death!) over a 16 year old boy and possessed him.
Met a woman who suffered in labor 7 times, told her husband whenever his
wife was about to bring forth he must go to the room with a live rabbit,
walk around her once, then release the rabbit and drive it out of the room
- otherwise the womb would be expelled with the child: 3: 39. Philostratus
(8: 29) said, "About the manner of his death, if he really did die, there
are many stories." On alleged other parallels, cf. Laurence J. McGinley,
"Hellenic Analogies and the typical Healing Narrative" in "Theological
Studies" 4 (1943) 385-419.
Even the nonconservative NJBC on pp. 1320-21, admits that even in His own
day, enemies did not deny His cures and exorcisms - might attribute them
to devil or magic.
For those who deny possibility of any miracles, we point to scientifically
checked cases: the miraculous host of Lanciano, which has had three checks
by teams of Doctors and biologists, was found to be part of human heart,
containing type AB blood, no preservative, while the clots of blood from
the chalice are of same type, and are true human blood; the tilma of
Guadalupe, with its picture unexplained by science, fresh after 450 years;
the cures of Lourdes, e.g., the cure of Madame Biré, in 1908, who had
atrophy of the papilla, was able to see even before the nerve recovered,
after Blessed Sacrament passed in procession (this really implies the
abiding Real Presence too, which no other church holds for).
We add: since God's power is ultimate agent in miracles, He will not
supply power to prove a lie.
(4) In the crowds, He had a smaller group to whom He spoke more, the
Twelve. Really, this is just what we would expect. Nor did He intend His
work to be for just one generation. That would be foolish. Many parables
spoke of Him as the final judge, and He promised to be with them all days.
(5) He sent them out to preach, and told them to continue His work. This
is only what we would expect.
(6) He told them that God would protect their teaching. Really, we would
expect a messenger sent by God with so great a mission to provide for
this. So He told them (Lk 10:16): "He who hears you hears me; and he who
rejects you, rejects me, and he who rejects me, rejects him who sent me."
Similar statements come in Mt 18:17-18, plus Mt 16:19 and Mt 18:18, Mt
18:16-19, Jn 13:20.
Protestants object: He merely identified with the apostles as He did with
the poor. We reply: Yes, but notice under what aspect: identifies with the
poor as poor, with His teachers as His teachers.
Conclusion to the six points: What have we before us now? A group or
church, commissioned to teach by one sent by God, and promised God's
protection. Then we not only may, intellectually, but intellectually
should believe what they tell us, and that in spite of the character of
later recipients of the commission.
We can then ask this group many things: Are the ancient documents
inspired? Yes. Is the messenger divine? Yes. Is there a Pope? Yes, and
they will tell us what authority the Pope has. In this way we have no need
to struggle against all the objections in Mt 16.
And we have also by this means a bypass around the worries of Meier and
others. We need only the 6 simple facts for that. Then this group or
Church can tell us whatever else we need to know about Jesus in the
Gospels.
This may seem long and complex, but it is really very simple. As
preliminary we notice that we can use the Gospels as merely ancient
documents, we know the writers - we need not know their names - were
intent on the truth about Jesus, for eternity depends on it. We know they
had many sources to get at the facts, if they were not eyewitness
themselves. We know that there are some thing so simple in structure that
subjectivity cannot be injected. We then sought and found 6 points: There
was a man Jesus who claimed He was sent by God, did enough to prove that
by miracles in cases with a tie between the claim and the miracle. In the
crowds He had a smaller circle, spoke more, told them to continue His
work, promised God's protection.
Now the Church does not directly teach Scriptural method, except
indirectly inasmuch as a wrong method would be harmful to faith. It does
teach that God is the chief Author, and therefore there can be no error or
clash between one part of Scripture and another (DV paragraph 12): "Since
Sacred Scripture is to be read and interpreted by the same Spirit by which
it was written, to rightly draw out the sense of the sacred texts, we must
look not less diligently to the content and unity of all of Scripture,
taking into account the living Tradition of the whole Church and the
analogy of faith." Therefore an interpretation that might be proposed
which would clash even by implication with the teaching of other books,
with the Tradition of the Church and basic teachings of the Church, is to
be rejected out of hand.
Hence the proposal to see in Job 14:13 a denial of afterlife must be
rejected, and it is not "unmitigated disaster" to reject it even if one
would not know the how of explaining the fact. Again, even though we may
note that one Evangelist has a different scope and method of presentation
than another, this does not allow us to propose a clash, as Wilfrid
Harrington did, who said that in Mk 3:20-35 Our Lady is surely part of
the group mentioned in the first part, and so she did not believe in her
Son, and therefore was ("Mark," Glazier, 1979, pp. 47-48), "outside the
sphere of salvation." For Luke, and the Church, insist she already at the
annunciation, (DV paragraph 56) "embracing the will of God with full
heart, held back by no sin, dedicated herself totally as the handmaid of
the Lord to the person and work of her Son."
Pius XII in "Divino afflante Spiritu," in 1943 positively encouraged the
approach via literary genres. That approach was not forbidden before, as
some charge. Rather, on June 23, 1905 the Biblical Commission was asked if
we could hold that some books that seem historical are really something
else. The reply was: yes, provided we have proof, and stay with the
Church. Pius XII as we said positively encouraged this approach. But that
is not teaching or legislation, it is pointing out what in the nature of
things is needed. Vatican II, in DV paragraph 12 pointed out that the
truth can be expressed in various ways in various literary patterns or
genres. For example, in a modern historical novel we find a mixture of
history and fiction. The key word is assert. So DV paragraph 11 said:
"Since everything which the inspired authors. . . assert should be
considered as asserted by the Holy Spirit, hence the books of Scripture
are to be professed as teaching firmly, faithfully, and without error the
truth which God wanted entrusted to the Sacred Letters for the sake of our
salvation."
There were other early decisions by the Commission, most of them having to
do with authorship - which does not pertain to faith. We mention specially
the decision that there was only one "Isaiah." Really, the arguments given
for three Isaiahs were never really convincing. Stylistic arguments are
never conclusive. And the pattern of threats of punishment, exile, promise
of restoration - this is merely the well-know Deuteronomic pattern. Why
could not Isaiah use it?
Really it would not be faithful to the sacred text to read it as if
written by a modern American. That would be to impose our ideas on the
text. Rather, we must try to find what the sacred writer meant to say,
what he asserted. If we do this, we find the answers to a whole host of
problems of seeming errors which could not be answered without this help.
The Biblical Commission in 1964 spoke of Form and Redaction Criticism. It
warned that in practice scholars often inject rationalism into it, denying
the possibility of any real revelation, prophecy or miracle. But it said
that if we avoid these things, we can find the method profitable. And
indeed we can. We mention just one thing which the critics have
overlooked. If we drop their totally unfounded claim that the early
community was creative, we get the following three stages for the
development of the Gospels: 1) The words and actions of Jesus, who would
adapt His language to the current audience; 2) the way the Apostles and
others preached these things, again, with adaptation to the current
audience. So they might change the wording, but would be diligent to keep
the sense; 3) Some individuals within the Church, moved by the Holy
Spirit, wrote down some part of this basic preaching. This was the
Gospels. Therefore the Church has something more basic than the Gospels,
its own ongoing teaching. There are other services this method can give to
the truth, as long as we work with care. Then we will not find it
bankrupt.
So we need not wait a generation to learn sound Scriptural method. We
already know. We see we can prove teaching authority of Church without a
fideism that just jumps onto Cloud 9. Then we can let the Church settle
points Meier and others worry over. And we can and should use approach via
genres, plus at times Form & Redaction criticism, without going into the
excesses of which the Church warned. So now we can really do solid work.